On Wednesday, former Crimson Tide offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin took what many considered to be a subtle jab at his former boss when answering a question about Saban’s coaching style compared to his own on Sirius XM radio.
The money line from Kiffin was: “I’m not really big on humiliating the assistant coaches in front of everybody.”
On Thursday, Saban had a radio interview of his own with The Opening Drive morning show in Birmingham. And while Saban didn’t address anything Kiffin said on the surface, you didn’t have to dig too deep to find what appears to be a subtle jab of his own.
Saban was asked about the development of rising sophomore QB Jalen Hurts, and he gave a carefully worded response. The meaning of which is in the eyes of the beholder.
“I think we protected him a little bit last year and it didn’t enhance his development,” Saban told The Opening Drive. “And sometimes later in the year when people played us in a way that we needed to be able to throw the ball, we may not have been as efficient as we would have liked to have been. That was probably our fault as coaches because we protected him instead of developing him as a young player. The goal this spring, and certainly before next season, is that we can create more balance by being a better passing team to go along with what we’re able to do with our feet as a quarterback. As well as how that creates balance for our overall offense and utilizes some of the other skill players that we have which we didn’t always take advantage of last year.”
So, just to recap, Saban took an upbeat question about the performance of his starting quarterback and turned it into a critique of the play calling, offensive talent utilization and quarterback development from his coaching staff last season.